Carmen San Diego was the first person—and fictional serial criminal—who opened my eyes to the wonders of travel. Technically, she is just an animated woman in a crimson trench coat who never spoke, but all of us 90s kids watching Carmen San Diego knew that as much fun as it was to corner Carmen using our geography skills, it would be even better to be her. She might have been on the lam, but she still got to see the Taj Mahal, boat down the Amazon, and dodge gumshoes in the hallowed halls of the Louvre. Slippery thief though she was, I hoped I could grow up to be as stylish, savvy and worldly as Carmen.
I graduated from my PBS Kids days, but I never outgrew my desire to explore the world. I loved school and I loved books—I saw both of them as vehicles to being able to travel. The first international trip I took outside of the United States was to Brussels, Belgium with my parents in my senior year of high school. It felt like I had waited ages to take that trip, literally my whole life.
The trip was overwhelming. Despite four years of French under my belt, the best I could do was very clumsily order a coffee. I stood in the striking medieval square of Brussels, the sun sinking behind its many steeples: this is just a teeny tiny piece of Europe, I remember thinking. And yet, it was my first step out into the great, big world. I was determined to make it the first of many.
The closer I got to adulthood, the clearer it became that I couldn’t rely on my parents or a job to enable me to travel—it was up to me to go where I wanted. Travel is a privilege as much as it is a joy; it can be a challenge, but it can also be addicting. The more I travel, the more I hunger to travel more.
The most important thing I can tell you about travel, though, is that it is good for you. Whether you’re traveling three states away or planning to multi-continent hop, that trip will affect a change in you. It will help you grow, and your bulbs will burn that much brighter.
TRAVEL HELPS YOU UNDERSTAND OTHERS
Seeing the way people in other cities, countries, and hemispheres live their lives certainly exposes our differences, but it surprisingly reveals similarities above all else. Maya Angelou said once, “Perhaps travel cannot prevent bigotry, but by demonstrating that all peoples cry, laugh, eat, worry, and die, it can introduce the idea that if we try and understand each other, we may even become friends.”
The best travelers work to immerse themselves where they are. They ask questions, shop at the local grocery stores and markets—they willingly get a little lost. The more cultural ideas we come to understand, the less we will blindly cling to our own.
TRAVEL HELPS YOU UNDERSTAND YOURSELF
Above I mentioned how the best travelers willingly get a little lost. I, personally, happen to strongly dislike getting lost. Especially when it’s midnight, I can’t find my hotel and I’m jetlagged, grimy and desperately want to crash. However, I chose to travel and move abroad when I felt the most lost, unsure, and confused in my life. In breaking the attachments I had—jobs, friends, crushes, closets full of stuff—I was better able to understand what I truly wanted out of life.
Travel gave me confidence: I grew up shy and self-doubting. But traveling alone, I became someone who made friends at train stations and hostel lounges, who learned to make risotto on the first try, who could teach herself basic Italian and even rudimentary Korean. Who you become outside of your comfort zone will surprise you.
TRAVEL IS FUN!
Carmen San Diego’s signature smirk gives it away: travelers are having questionably legal amounts of fun. Yes, there are the tiring and boring parts—delayed flights, long lines, loud snorers in your train car—but, much more so, there is wonder and awe. As Dr. Seuss says: Oh! the places you’ll go! There will be new words to learn (even if you’re only traveling in the US!), new people to meet, and weird snacks to try! There will be things on this Earth that will astonish you (often, but not always, in a good way). I have been very liberally paraphrasing Dr. Seuss here, but I can guarantee you, Smart Girls, that making travel a part of your life, in small or large ways, will add thrill, wonder, and wisdom to it.
Source : amysmartgirls
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